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‘Race Bait’ Can Be Click Bait Too, Right?

Wouldn’t it be lovely if national TV networks were completely transparent with their ratings tactics? They know milking a cow dry will provide refreshment for everyone in the line of sight, but if that quart tastes like canal water, does the strategy really work?

Don’t all PR people realize that’s what these diva national TV networks are doing? Of course, we do. MEMO to the aforementioned networks tanking in a sea of despair: your viewers know this as well.

For instance, the Melissa Harris-Perry ballyhoo: You know, she throws up a picture of Mitt Romney’s family that could fit in 14 Winnebagos, focuses on his one adopted black grandson and breaks into a chorus of the old Sesame Street classic, “One of these things is not like the other.”

Whelp, some just about everyone is thinking that crap is done on purpose.

On Tuesday, Wall Street Journal editor said what many are thinking — at least, what many who don’t think Melissa Harris-Perry is a sterling journalist are thinking. The whole segment turned apology turned cryfest turned into viral ratings bonanza was all “race baiting.“

What’s interesting to note is that this is far from the first time MSNBC has been accused of dangling that piece of chum on the line for its viewers. There’s the uber-brilliant Michael Eric Dyson being accused of it here:

There’s the one-word wonder Toure, who wants to have the mystique of Prince but comes off more like needing a rehab (of his image) like Ke$ha.

And what would a good “race-bait-gone-click-bait” frenzy be without the one and the only (thank the good Lord) Ann Coulter?

Will Walter Cronkite pick up the white courtesy phone? We need some divine help for news. Please. That, or send me a fishing pole with some bait because we want some ratings at PRNewser too. Because editors and stuff.